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ZION'S ALARM

NOT WITHOUT CAUSE.

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I RECEIVED yours, and acknow

ledge that an epistle was due to you, payable a fortnight after I had the last sight of you at Newberry. But you must acknowledge, that the treasure of grace is in an earthen vessel; and, consequently, a distinction ought to be made between the vessel and the treasure, as well as between the manna and the golden pot. Paul was obliged to make a difference between his promises to visit, and the promised salvation which had visited him. "In this confidence," said he, "I was minded to come unto you before, and to pass by you into Macedonia, and to come again out of Macedonia unto you.-When I therefore was thus minded, did I use lightness? or the things that I purpose, do I purpose according to the flesh, that with me there should be yea, yea, and nay, nay?

But as God is true, our word toward you was not yea and nay. For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us," 2 Cor. i. 15—20. You are the first carnal man that ever solicited a spiritual epistle from me; therefore I am constrained to send it, that it may serve for the eighth wonder of the world. I have the happiness once a week of visiting a place called Kingswood; a place I have often wished to see, having read so much about it in the works of those eminent servants of God Mr. Whitfield and Mr. Cenneck. And to be sure there are some choice souls among those subterraneous miners. Six days they are hidden ones, but on the Lord's day great numbers of these Hebrews, as the Philistines said of the Jews, come forth out of their holes, to enjoy both the light of the sun and the light of the gospel; thus, like a certain set of debtors, they appear abroad once a week: they seem somewhat pleased that they have got a brother tradesman in their pulpit; and, blessed be God, he has condescended more than once to visit us, though we are but a poor smutty family.

I bless God, at Bristol, I am constantly attended with a very crowded audience, who give me great attention, and I trust God gives testimony to the word of his grace, Acts xiv. 3. But I shall leave that to those who believe and receive the report of the gospel.

Indeed, Sir, we live in a day of much apostasy; in a day, when there is, agreeable to ancient pro

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